Hillary’s Missing Girls

Hillary’s Missing Girls

Last week, at the New Hampshire Democratic Town Hall, a woman with five daughters—all millennials, all feeling the Bern—asked Hillary Clinton how she could bring her girls back to HRC’s camp. It was a striking question. There is a very real and staggering lack of support for Clinton among young female voters, but the divide is also generational. In Iowa, 84 percent of women under 30 voted for Sanders; in the New Hampshire Primary, the results were nearly identical—82 percent of women under 30 voted for him, while women over 45 favored Clinton. Where is the feminist love among America’s young women?

Hillary was the first First Lady who refused to conceal her education and ambition. She insisted on tackling serious policy issues. She tried to fix America’s healthcare woes despite an onslaught of personal and sexist attacks. The right vilified her as a radical leftist whispering in her centrist husband’s ear. She declared unapologetically that women’s rights are human rights; as Secretary of State, she didn’t just promote the advancement of women’s rights as a cornerstone of American foreign policy—she institutionalized it with positions and programs that will persist.

She’s one of the most (if not the most) credentialed, knowledgeable, and experienced presidential candidates in recent history. But young women aren’t excited about her.